If I call from Australia to AA on there Australian number do I end up in India? Ive tried to book a ticket and its so painful. The line is poor and I cannot get understood (perhaps this is my fault). I then asked my partner to do the booking and then they rang me back after three days to confirm whether I was the card holder even though my partner used her card. Alas they told me that it was confirmed but still no sign of a reciept or even the money coming out.
It is a bloody long and involved process, not sure if AA wants Australian business…
MAKE A BOOKING -
1./ Peruse flights and book online,
2./ Find the AA 1800 Australian telephone number on the website, and call,
3./ Your call is placed through to Indian call centre, on a pour quality “line” to people whose accent you can’t understand, and who can’t understand your accent,
4./ They confirm your flights, the price in Aussie Dollars and take your credit card details, call ends,
5./ Details are sent to the Sydney AA office, which then issues your e-ticket paperwork in the post!
Now, who said that electronic commerce shouldn’t be simple and paperwork-less?
CHANGE A BOOKING –
1./ 2./ 3./ are similar
4./ It may take an hour (give or take mysterious line-drop-outs) before you manage to get a consultant who understands what it is you want to do (this will be the case with anything, other than a straight-out ticket purchase).
5./ The consultant will need to contact the US (electronically) to get advice, and call you back
6./ Call back doesn’t occur.
7./ You call AA back the next day, to find out what is going on, new consultant looks at notes on your booking and advises the new charges that have been confirmed by AA US office.
8./ You say okay, and start to read out credit card details again, to pay the difference, but are informed paperwork will be sent out to you regarding this.
9./ Paperwork never arrives
10./ … I think you get the picture... I am getting a sore wrist...
Hint: UNTIL YOU HAVE BEEN ISSUED A TICKET NUMBER & ITINERARY ON AA STOCK, YOU DO NOT HAVE A TICKETED BOOKING! (Which, I know, is very different to how you book online with Australian based airlines.)
Use Skype, call the US, 1.7 EU Cents/minute. I think US 800# are free , if not it still really costs next to nothing compared to this annoying hassle. Or use an AA CTO or go to the airport or a travel agent fee or not.
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I use Skype all the time from my small Thailand village direct to The EXP AAngels in USA using the 1-800 number. Sometimes have problems giving my EXP Number to the automatic answering , but usually excellent and cheap.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ricktoronto
Use Skype, call the US, 1.7 EU Cents/minute. I think US 800# are free , if not it still really costs next to nothing compared to this annoying hassle. Or use an AA CTO or go to the airport or a travel agent fee or not.
Or purchase a GPS phone card and use it to call AA in the U.S., also for 1.7c/minute from any landline phone. I've found their call quality to be generally excellent.
I'm very disappointed to learn that AA outsources calls from Australia to call centers in India. Couldn't they contract with QF to handle these calls?
American Air moves Asia-Pacific call centre to India
Excerpts from the story from Reuters, as reported by Yahoo!:
American Airlines, a unit of AMR Corp., said on Thursday it had shifted its Asia-Pacific call centre operations to India from Australia.
American said Indian aviation technology firm Bird Information Systems Pvt. Ltd. would provide call centre services from its office in New Delhi.
"With increasing competition, lower margins and booming operational costs can be managed better by outsourcing non-core processes," Ankur Bhatia, executive director of Bird Group said.
Even calling from a "normal" phone the cost arent dramatic (I will be switching to skype myself shortly) and teh service I have had through AA in teh US has been excellent - I have absolutely no interest in using the Oz number.
As I recall the Europe call center still resides in Ireland ..
Lets hope that AA does not do any more call center movement (ala UA).
Calls from Spain (where there are separate lines for AAdvantage and general reservations) have been routed to the two Mexico call centers for a while now. AA closed its city ticket office, an advertising office, and a call center in Madrid all at the same time a few years back.
I believe the Portugal number routes to the São Paulo call center, which is fairly large.
It is possible right now for some US calls to end up being answered by the Mexican call centers. I am sort of surprised AA has not tried linking its other call centers (i.e. São Paulo) with the US lines. One benefit of the Latin American call centers is that if the transaction is a complicated one, the agents will take your number and call you back to complete the transaction rather than keeping you on hold. You can also ask to speak with a specific agent there.
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If you want to contact AA you can use the ATT USA DIRECT service for free. Just dial the toll free number of the country you are in and then dial the AA's 1-800 number you want to reach. The call will be connected without any charges for the caller.
